Italdesign Zerouno Roadster revealed ahead of Geneva debut

Italdesign Giugiaro turned 50 last week and celebrated with the announcement of a new supercar debuting at next month’s 2018 Geneva International Motor Show.

The supercar is the open-top version of last year’s Zerouno, the first car to be sold under Italdesign’s own eponymous brand.

As was the case with the Zerouno coupe, the Zerouno roadster from some angles resembles a scaled-down version of the Lamborghini Veneno, specifically the Lamborghini Veneno Roadster.

The similarities with the Veneno shouldn’t come as much of a surprise since the lead designer at Italdesign is former Lamborghini design boss Filippo Perini. Lamborghini’s parent company Audi is also the official owner of Italdesign within the Volkswagen Group. Of course, the Zerouno will always remains distinct due to its huge snout.

The original Zerouno is a coachbuilt special limited to just five examples, and we’re expecting the same number for the roadster. The asking price is thought to be a staggering $2.4 million for the roadster, including taxes, and two build slots have already been sold.

Both Zerouno variants are based on the chassis of a donor Audi R8 V10 Plus, whose 610-horsepower 5.2-liter V-10 motivates them to 62 mph in 3.2 seconds and a top speed of 205 mph. Not a single body panel is shared with the Audi supercar, however, with the Zerouno’s body crafted almost entirely from carbon fiber.

Italdesign was founded by Giorgetto Giugiaro and Aldo Mantovani on February 13 1968 in Turin, Italy, originally as a design and engineering business for the auto industry. It’s since expanded to other sectors, including the aviation industry. Some of the company’s more famous designs include the Bizzarrini Manta concept, the BMW M1, the DeLorean DMC-12 and the original Volkswagen Golf and Scirocco.

Sadly, Giugiaro and Mantovani are no longer with the company. They left in 2015 to form the new design company GFG Style, catering mostly to firms based in Asia. One of GFG Style’s creations will be on display at the upcoming Geneva show. The company was commissioned to design the Ren electric supercar for Chinese startup Techrules, and in Geneva we’ll see a new track-focused version dubbed the Ren RS.

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